Champagne Wins Her First Race — Against Some Very Stiff Opposition

There are victories in sailing that go down in history.

There are victories won by fractions of a second, after perfectly judged starts, tactical duels, immaculate mark roundings and desperate final tacks to the line.

And then there are victories like ours.

Champagne has won her first race.

Admittedly, the opposition included three particularly formidable A-Raters:

• Still on the Grass
• No Crew Available
• No Wind

The first two never actually made it onto the river.

The third accompanied us for most of the afternoon and very nearly won.

But history records winners, not excuses.

And Champagne crossed the finish line.

The Fleet Assembles — Sort Of

Conditions were not exactly what you would call ideal racing weather.

There was virtually no wind.

For an ordinary dinghy this might have been a good reason to leave the boat ashore, sit on the terrace and discuss sailing instead.

An A-Rater, however, is hardly an ordinary dinghy.

With an enormous sail area and a hull designed to make the most of the lightest breath of air, the Thames A-Rater is one of those boats that can sometimes make you believe there is wind when every flag, tree and blade of grass around you suggests otherwise.

So Champagne was going racing.

Our competition was impressive.

Still on the Grass had adopted an unusually conservative tactical strategy and remained firmly attached to the lawn.

No Crew Available had failed to complete the crucial pre-race manoeuvre known as "finding some people".

And No Wind was already out on the course and looking extremely competitive.

It was therefore shaping up to be quite a contest.

First Tactical Error: Helping Everybody Else

Our preparations for the first race were perhaps not quite America's Cup standard.

While the starting sequence approached, Champagne's crew were helping other sailors get their boats onto the water.

This is one of the rather nice things about club sailing.

You can spend all week imagining ruthless racing tactics, competitive starts and finely judged mark roundings, but when somebody needs a hand launching a boat, you give them a hand.

The consequence was predictable.

Champagne was late for the start.

By the time we had sorted ourselves out, turned towards the line and persuaded the boat to move, the race was already under way.

Normally, being late to a start is bad.

When there is almost no wind, however, "late" becomes a wonderfully flexible concept.

If everyone is travelling at approximately the speed of continental drift, thirty seconds is not necessarily the catastrophe it might be in twenty knots.

We turned.

Champagne crawled towards the line.

We crossed it.

And then something extraordinary happened.

We Found Some Wind

A gust arrived.

Not a gale.

Not even what most sailors would consider particularly noteworthy.

But on this particular afternoon it felt like someone had switched on a jet engine.

The sails filled.

Champagne accelerated.

The water began moving past the hull rather than simply reflecting it.

We were racing.

Ahead of us was the long mark, just beyond Spade Oak.

For a glorious few moments Champagne was doing exactly what an A-Rater is supposed to do: taking a small amount of wind, converting it into boat speed and gliding majestically up the Thames.

We began to think that perhaps this racing business was not so difficult after all.

Naturally, that was when the wind stopped.

Completely.

No Wind Makes Its Move

As we approached the long mark, our most dangerous opponent appeared.

No Wind.

No Wind had clearly been sandbagging earlier in the race.

Now it attacked.

The sails sagged.

The boat stopped.

The river, meanwhile, had ideas of its own.

There was just enough current to begin carrying us backwards.

This creates one of those wonderful sailing situations in which you are pointing towards the mark, trying desperately to sail towards it, while watching it very slowly get further away.

There was no useful airflow over the sails.

There was little meaningful steerage.

And the rudder was rapidly becoming something of an optimistic suggestion rather than a steering device.

No Wind was winning.

Paul Tries the 360-Degree Solution

Paul was at the helm.

Faced with a boat that had almost completely stopped responding, he tried something different.

He turned Champagne through 360 degrees.

Under normal racing circumstances, deliberately spinning the boat around in a circle would not necessarily appear in the first chapter of Successful A-Rater Racing Tactics.

But these were not normal circumstances.

Somewhere during the turn we found the faintest breath of moving air.

The sail stirred.

Champagne began moving again.

Slowly.

Very slowly.

But crucially, forwards.

We reached the upstream mark.

We rounded it.

No Wind had been beaten.

For now.

Sailing Downwind When You Cannot Find the Wind

Turning downstream presented another problem.

When there is plenty of wind, working out where it is coming from is relatively straightforward.

You can feel it.

The sails tell you.

The ripples on the water tell you.

The burgee tells you.

When there is almost no wind, all of these indicators can start telling slightly different stories.

We knew approximately where the wind ought to be.

The difficulty was discovering where it actually was.

So we drifted gently downstream, adjusting sails, watching the water and looking for anything that suggested air was moving somewhere on the Thames.

Eventually it did.

The breeze returned.

Champagne gathered speed.

Then came something almost unbelievable.

A proper gust.

The boat accelerated enough for us to see white water at the bow.

After spending much of the race wondering whether we were actually moving at all, this felt like foiling.

No Wind disappeared behind us.

Champagne was flying.

Or at least moving at a speed detectable without specialist scientific equipment.

Through the Handicap Fleet

We were sharing the river with the handicap fleet, although they were sailing a different course.

As the wind strengthened slightly, Champagne's enormous sail area began to show its advantage.

One of the fascinating things about sailing an A-Rater is how dramatically the boat responds when it finds some pressure.

One moment you can be sitting almost motionless.

Then the sail fills and the long, narrow hull begins slipping through the water at an unexpectedly impressive pace.

We started overhauling boats ahead.

Suddenly it felt much more like racing.

We approached the home mark.

Waiting there were our old opponents:

Still on the Grass and No Crew Available.

Admittedly neither had moved very far since the start.

But psychologically they remained dangerous.

We gybed gently around the mark.

No dramatic roll.

No crash gybe.

No shouting.

Just a careful turn in almost no wind.

Still on the Grass remained on the grass.

No Crew remained crewless.

Champagne swept majestically past both of them.

Our lead was becoming commanding.

The Wind Finally Chooses Our Side

Now we had to sail upriver again.

And this time something remarkable happened.

The wind actually cooperated.

Champagne settled into her course and began moving gently but consistently upstream.

We passed the Short Mark.

Then the Medium Mark.

The Long Mark remained ahead.

The question occupying all of us was obvious.

Would the wind last long enough to get there?

After our experience on the first lap, there was no guarantee.

But this time it did.

We reached the Long Mark for the second and final time, rounded it and headed back towards the club.

The wind was now more or less behind us and we could stay on essentially the same tack for much of the return journey.

For once, everything felt reasonably straightforward.

Which should probably have warned us that something was about to happen.

A Race Within a Race

The handicap fleet was finishing too, although its boats were sailing a shorter course, only going as far as the Medium Mark.

That meant the river suddenly became rather busier.

And Champagne was moving.

With her large sail area she began rapidly overhauling the other boats.

One of them was a Hadron, technically taking part in a completely different race.

This minor detail did not seem important.

There was another boat.

There was a finish line.

We were catching it.

Therefore, obviously, we were racing it.

There are occasions when sailors become extraordinarily sophisticated about rules, handicaps and tactical positioning.

There are other occasions when the entire tactical calculation becomes:

"There's a boat in front. Catch it."

We caught it.

The finish line approached.

Champagne surged towards it.

And we crossed.

First.

Except Apparently We Had Finished on the Wrong Side

Our celebration lasted several seconds.

Then we heard that we might have crossed the wrong side of the finishing mark.

We were fairly sure we hadn't.

But this did not seem the ideal moment to argue.

Having spent what felt like several geological ages getting around the course, being disqualified for finishing on the wrong side of a mark would have been a particularly impressive achievement.

So Paul turned Champagne around.

We sailed back.

And, for completeness, crossed the other side as well.

That should cover all possible interpretations.

We tied up.

Then the Officer of the Day gave us the good news.

We had been right the first time.

Champagne had crossed on the correct side.

It was the Hadron that had gone the wrong way.

Our emergency second finish had therefore been entirely unnecessary.

Still, it demonstrated admirable thoroughness.

Champagne Had Won

And so it was official.

Champagne had won her first race with us.

There may be some unreasonable people who will point out that Champagne was the only A-Rater to start.

These people are technically correct.

But that is surely missing the wider achievement.

To win a race, first you have to enter it.

Then you have to rig the boat.

Launch it.

Find a crew.

Cross the start line.

Get around the marks.

Survive No Wind.

And finish.

Champagne did all of those things.

Still on the Grass did not.

No Crew Available never stood a chance.

And even No Wind eventually had to concede defeat.

So I think the result should stand.

First and Last — Our Two Favourite Positions

There is, of course, a wonderfully satisfying contradiction in all this.

We came first.

And because we were the only A-Rater racing, we also came last.

Normally we have considerably more experience with the second of those positions.

So perhaps this represents progress.

For once, when somebody asks where Champagne finished, we can confidently say:

First.

There is absolutely no need to volunteer any additional information.

Alex's First Sail in an A-Rater

There was another part of the day that mattered much more than the result.

It was Alex's first time sailing in an A-Rater.

He joined us as mid-hand, learning a role that can look rather confusing from the outside.

An A-Rater is not simply a larger version of an ordinary dinghy. There is a lot happening aboard one of these boats, and the mid-hand has an important part in keeping everything working.

On a windy day, learning the role might have been a rather more intense experience.

On this particular day we had something much more valuable.

Time.

Lots of it.

There were periods when Champagne was moving so slowly that conversation became a major part of the day's activity.

And that meant we could talk.

Alex had recently received his A-level results, so between the marks we talked about his successes, university, what might come next and some of the choices that lie ahead.

That is something I increasingly value about sailing.

A race does not have to be fast to be worthwhile.

Sometimes the quiet days create conversations that would never happen during an exciting twenty-knot blast around the course.

What Light-Wind Sailing Actually Teaches You

From a sailing point of view, the day was also surprisingly useful.

Very light winds expose everything.

In stronger winds you can sometimes get away with imperfect boat handling because there is enough power available to keep the boat moving.

In almost no wind, every unnecessary movement matters.

You begin noticing things such as:

Keeping momentum. Once the boat stops, getting it moving again can be remarkably difficult.

Watching the water. Tiny darker patches or ripples can reveal the next breath of wind.

Reducing rudder movement. Large helm movements create drag and can kill what little speed you have.

Maintaining sail shape. Over-sheeting in very light air can be disastrous.

Thinking ahead. A patch of wind twenty metres away may matter more than the precise shortest route towards the mark.

And occasionally:

Turning through 360 degrees because absolutely nothing else appears to be working.

I am not sure the RYA teaches that last one.

The Best Victory May Simply Be Getting Out There

It would be easy to dismiss the afternoon.

There was hardly any wind.

Only one A-Rater raced.

Our start was late.

At one point we drifted backwards.

We were unsure which way to finish.

And our most persistent opponent was a complete absence of moving air.

But that would miss the point.

Champagne went sailing.

A new crew member experienced an A-Rater for the first time.

We practised handling a demanding boat in extremely light conditions.

We helped other sailors launch before worrying about our own start.

We had time for some genuinely good conversations.

And we finished the course.

Most importantly, Alex wants to come again.

Naturally, his enthusiasm may have been influenced slightly by the fact that his first ever A-Rater race resulted in a 100% winning record.

We shall try not to explain statistics to him just yet.

Champagne's Racing Record

So Champagne now has her first victory.

The official tactical analysis is straightforward:

Champagne — 1

Still on the Grass — 0

No Crew Available — 0

No Wind — defeated after a prolonged tactical battle

We will undoubtedly face stronger opposition in future.

There will be faster boats.

Better starts.

Harder racing.

More wind.

And probably occasions when we return to our more traditional position towards the back of the fleet.

But nobody can take this one away from us.

Champagne crossed the line first.

And sometimes in sailing, as in life, simply being prepared to leave the grass and take part is enough to give yourself a chance of winning.

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